This invention relates to an apparatus or system for producing magnetically encoded articles.
In the context of the present invention, a magnetically encoded article is one in which a magnetic stripe is carried by an article for storing information. Credit cards, electronically encoded identification cards and magnetic programming cards for calculators are exemplary of the forms of magnetically encoded articles which may be produced by the present invention.
It is current practice to manufacture cards with magnetic stripes and stockpile such at issuing centers for subsequent embossing and encoding at the time of issuance. With the advent of credit authorization systems and printing terminals, magnetic stripe cards are becoming more important in the business world. It is anticipated that such cards, for the most part, will not contain embossed data, but store all transaction related information on the magnetic stripe. However, as explained herein, present day production methods do not readily lend themselves to the mass production of such cards.
With existing systems the first step in the manufacture of credit cards involves non-encoded card blanks which are produced and stockpiled for encoding at various locations. Generally, encoding of the magnetic stripe data is carried out by the card issuer, or organization responsible for operation of the card plan. In addition, human-readable indicia is often formed on the card. Commonly this is done by embossing at the time of encoding which also allows data capture by imprinting at the point of sale. The encoded cards must then be prepared for mailing to the user. A mailing envelope is printed and the finished credit card inserted therein with a printed folder. It is not uncommon for systems to automatically print the envelopes and folders.
Credit card production methods commonly practiced are order-dependent. In other words, the human-readable indicia placed on the card corresponds to particular magnetically encoded information, such as account number. Therefore, it is necessary to keep the cards in the same sequence in which they were encoded. Further, maintaining the correspondence of cards to printed jackets and envelopes to which they correspond is also order-dependent.
Certain disadvantages arise from the commonly practiced procedures. In the encoding process, the card blanks are moved past a recording head by a transport apparatus for encoding. For satisfactory encoding, it is necessary to control interbit jitter within certain standards. Generally speaking, interbit jitter is non-uniformity in spacing of digital bits encoded in the magnetic material. This is due primarily to variations in speed or timing during the encoding process. Even when a shaft encoder is utilized with the transport, slippage between the card blank and the drive rollers will result in interbit jitter. Due to the mass and inertia of a card blank, glazing of the drive roll, misadjustment of drive roll force, etc., the slippage may be significant resulting in an unacceptable level of interbit jitter. On the other hand, it is less difficult to maintain tolerances for interbit jitter when encoding the information directly onto magnetic tape not affixed to a card. Thus, it would be desirable to have a system for producing credit cards wherein the magnetic information is recorded prior to bonding of the tape to the blank.
Another disadvantage is that if a card is improperly encoded, it must be rerun with the next batch or sequence of cards. This requires that the data for that particular card be recorded on the master tape for the subsequent run or otherwise inputted into the system. Such results in modification of the original card order and causes significant delays and additional handling steps in the process. This is true even for systems which do not emboss data on the cards. Therefore, it would be desirable to have a system capable of re-encoding cards automatically and maintaining the original card sequence.